Let's say that the famous shot from Bismarck that kills HMS Hood hits as in OTL, but only manages to cook off an aft 4 inch magazine-badly, badly damaging Hood and killing several hundred of her crew. In what was later calculated at a nearly 80,000 to 1 Act of God, the aft 15 inch magazine stays intact and Hood manages to barely limp back to port. Is the RN still going to be as paranoid about Tirpitz as they are in OTL without the psychological scar caused by the catastrophic loss of Hood and her crew of 1,400 plus?
WI: HMS Hood Manages To Limp Back to Port After Tangling With Bismarck
- Thread starter politicalnomad
- Start date
Hood gets patched up in Glasgow before being sent to the US for her much needed rebuild.
Tirpitz is a threat that needs to be watched, as do the Twins. Hood surviving doesn't change that and she won't be ready to return to service before late 1942 at the earliest, more likely it takes another year to rebuild her. One interesting aspect of Hood surviving is that Vanguard isn't as needed and the British may accept the proposal for her to be completed as a carrier.
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Well any thing that save the Hood and my grandfather perks my interest. One thing that plays on my mind is what would have happened if her turn was ordered five minutes before it was. Would Hood have been able to take Bismark if the shell had missed the magazine possibly she had the fleets best sailors highly competent and motivated but she was old and badly neglected who is to say.
It’s ironic that one grandfather went down with Hood and the other was on Repulse thankfully he lived.
It’s ironic that one grandfather went down with Hood and the other was on Repulse thankfully he lived.
Almost certainly - the hit was one in a million even as it was. With even a slight change of course, range, target angle, sea state, and a hundred other things the chances of replicating the exact conditions are the next thing to impossible. Even avoiding beginning the turn, and therefore leaning into it, at the exact moment the fifth salvo arrived, might have been enough to save her
Simply being there would have had an effect - the Mk V Dreyer wasn't the pinnacle of fire control technology any more, but her shooting wasn't poor by any means, and the 15" Mk 1 was still one of the best naval weapons on the planet. That meant that Bismarck had to treat her as a serious threat, and as long as Bismarck was shooting at Hood, it meant she wasn't shooting at Prince of Wales. That allowed PoW to conduct undisturbed gunnery practice and inflict what ultimately turned out to be fatal damage. If Hood had survived longer, that undisturbed gunneery would have continued longer, Norfolk and Suffolk would have joined in, and even Bismarck's short-term survive prospects would have started to look distinctly iffy.
Yes, they will be. The general course of the war confined Tirpitz to northern waters but she was still a major threat to artic convoys. Her presence along with other heavy units tied down the Home Fleet when the RN was short of battleships in other theaters. In 1944 the RN only had the 4 modern KGV class BBs, the aging Rodney & Nelson, 4 QE's, (The Warspite was never fully operational again after being hit by a Fritz X.) the modernized BC Renown, and the 3 old R class.
In a fight with the Tirpitz the RN could only count on the KGV & the slower Nelson Class ships. The rest of the BB's were really only good as escorts or for shore bombardment. When the RN formed the Pacific Fleet in 1945 only the KGV's were sent, the older BBs were too slow and vulnerable.
Ramp-Rat
Monthly Donor
A damaged Hood even if the damage was severe, is going to continue to fight, and the combination of Hood and POW, will eventually overwhelm Bismarck. Which will be a massive boost to the RN, as they won’t have to go to the extreme measures that they did to chase down Bismarck and sink her. The effect on the German Navy will be similar to that IOTL, Hitler will lose a confidence in surface ships, and as he did put Reader out to grass eventually. The British have a major propaganda victory, and one that they will trumpet around the world, especially in the United States and South America. Hood once patched up and made fit for a transatlantic crossing will sail for America and the much needed total refit she so desperately needed. Tirpitz was a threat that had to be constrained, but the Germans lacked the fuel and the escorts for her to sail into the Atlantic and threaten the vital transatlantic convoys. As for Vanguard if Hood is still about and has had a complete refit, I doubt that she will be built, there for it all depends on when she is cancelled, if it’s early enough, the slipway assigned to her might be used instead to lay down the first of the Malta class aircraft carriers. If however a lot of work on her had been completed, then there is a good chance that she will be redesigned as an aircraft carrier.
RR
RR
Unlikely Bismarck is sunk. Prince of Wales had most of her gun's malfunction during the battle leaving only the forward guns of Hood to fight on. The mistake the Germans made in the OTL was after the Hood blowup they should have pursued the POW and sunk her. If Bismarck had taken any more damage, she would have reversed course and sailed back to Germany for repairs. If Bismarck returned to Germany after sinking 2 RN battleships it would be a major blow to British moral. That was also the time that the RN was taking a pounding off Crete. They really needed the moral boost of singing the Bismarck.
If Hood sinks Bismarck then she is pretty much as famous as otl. And she gets rebuilt possibly in the US and has a mostly standard WW1 experience like most of the RN/USN battle ships assigned to the Atlantic.
If she does not sink Bismarck then a lot of her fame does not happen. But as above she serves out WW2 in the Atlantic. Most likely as part of the force kept around to counter Tripitz.
If she does not sink Bismarck then a lot of her fame does not happen. But as above she serves out WW2 in the Atlantic. Most likely as part of the force kept around to counter Tripitz.
I know HMS POW was not doing well early in the battle but with 4 lovely 15 inch guns banging away as well I can not see Bismarck not being crippled. I can see HMS POW getting severe damage but until ordered to do otherwise while both ships exist no retreat will be envisioned. I can see HMS POW trying to keep the Germans away from HMS Hood but capital ship battles rarely work out as expected. Sometimes firing non stop achieves nothing and then a single salvo takes out half your enemies firepower.
Incorrect. Yes, she suffered a lot of malfunctions, but she was also able to correct them and bring the offending weapons back into action. The downside to being forced into action with civilian specialists aboard is that it shows you're still working out the kinks and you're likely to have issues. The upside is that you've got some of the best qualified people on the planet to fix those issues.
That ignores the fact that Bismarck also had serious damage, and turning back would have brought Norfolk and Suffolk into action. Prinz Eugen couldn't take them both on, and their toropedoes were a serious threat.
Assuming she was able to fight her way past PoW and the cruisers, and assuming that if she was able to do that she didn't run into the rest of the Home Fleet (KGV, Repulse, Victorious, etc), and even if she'd been able to do that she would still be left with the problem of repeating her attempted breakout. Lutjens knew what he was doing when he decided to make for Brest instead of reversing course.
The chances of Bismarck getting a magazine hit was a lot better than 1 in a million. Hood made the turn to bring her aft guns to bare. Until then only her forward battery could fire. Hood's armor scheme was a faulty design which left her highly vulnerable to really any kind of heavy shell fire. Prinz Eugen's 8" guns had already started a serious fire in the ready AA ammo between the ship's funnels. Minutes later a hit from Bismarck blow the ship up. Without the turn Hood would still be taking plunging fire from 15 and 8" AP shells, and her armor wasn't thick enough to protect her.
Very early in the battle POW's guns began to malfunction so, most of them were quickly out of action. That's why POW had no alternative to withdrawing from the battle after Hood blowup. Norfolk & Suffolk as cruisers wanted to keep their distance from a battleship duel.
The same is on the German side, Helmuth Brinkman wanted to launch a torpedo attack on HMS Prince of Wales in OTL, but Günther Lütjens ordered a retreat. In TTL, if HMS Hood is still in the fight, Prinz Eugen goes after her and tries to torpedo her, whether she succeeds is another question. But I repeat, Helmuth Brinkman would have carried out the torpedo attack.
Günther Lütjens did not withdraw from the battle because Bismarck was damaged, he withdrew from the battle because such were his operational orders. And the British allowed him to withdraw because they were trying to escape in OTL. And Captain John Leach knew very well why he was running, because to continue the battle was suicide.
Lütjens did not go to France immediately after the battle, that is a myth. He wanted to sail to Belchen to refuel. His original plan was that he wanted to continue the mission. But it turned out that it was not possible. It wasn't until a few hours after the battle, when he received news from his technicians, that he headed for Brest. So he had to cancel his original plan because he was running out of fuel and he paid the price for somehow forgetting to fill it up already in Bergen. When he had a great opportunity to do so.
The home fleet was too far away, they couldn't stop him in OTL, they wouldn't even be able to stop him in TTL. Lütjens had a huge opportunity on May 24, 1941, which he squandered through his stupidity. Throughout the mission, he followed orders that expired as early as five o'clock in the morning on May 24.
Otherwise to the shooting of HMS Hood, it shot poorly..., Prinz Eugen hit it within the first minute of the fight. Bismarck hesitated to fire and her guns fell silent for several minutes before Lindemann took charge. And ordered to open fire on HMS Hood. Those few minutes may have been decisive. HMS Hood could well have exploded two or three minutes earlier than in OTL. If at the beginning of the battle Günther Lütjens had not hesitated whether to fight or not. All along he tried to avoid action, he gave the British a chance, they didn't take it. And then he did everything to prepare himself for a crushing victory.
Incorrect. Hood wasn't sailing with awnings rigged, so her after guns had been bare since she'd sailed from Scapa Flow.
Incorrect. She was certainly vulnerable at long range, and she wasn't suitable for close-range action against other capital ships, but on the whole she was decently protected.
Not relevent - the fire was being ignored to let it burn itself out, as it posed no risk to the ship.
At the range she was hit, her armour scheme provided good to very good protection against 15" shellfire, and for her to be hit by plunging 15" fire was flat out impossible - she was too close.
I refer you to my earlier post regarding PoW's guns
PoW was forced to withdraw because she was now the sole target of Bismarck's gunnery, Nolfolk and Suffolk were still out of range, and she'd been hit repeatedly. It wasn't a matter of the issues with the main battery being the sole problem - without all the other problems that could, and had been, managed.
Incorrect. They both had the hammer down trying to close to effective battle range ASAP.
Her guns were unreliable and broke down at different times during the battle. While retreating Y turret jammed meaning they couldn't have replied if the Bismarck had chased her. POW was lucky a 15" shell that hit below the waterline failed to explode, she would've lost at least one boiler room. POW wasn't battle ready and her commitment to the Bismarck chase was only made because the RN was short of battleships at the time. Admiral Holland was heroically leading a unworthy battle force. Hood was too old and vulnerable, and POW was not fully operational, and her crew wasn't well trained yet.
The damage to Bismarck didn't degrade her combat effectiveness only her ability for long range cruising. If she's suffered more damage she'd have returned to German, or at the least to Norway. There were no British battleships in a position to stop them. Admiral Tovey was steaming to the south in KGV in company with Renown and was in no position to intercept Bismarck on a course back to Norway.
If Bismarck sank the POW, the two CAs would've gotten out of the way. The rest of the Home Fleet was patrolling other possible exit routes into the Atlantic though the GIUK gap. Going back to Norway was the safest thing Bismarck could've done, and it was the course of action Hitler recommended. He didn't understand why Bismarck didn't finish off the POW and then return to Germany. Lutjens would've returned a hero of the Fatherland and Hitler would've given him Oakleaves for his Knights Cross.
Given the Hoods position after the battle, they might make for Halifax to keep them out of the water around the UK and have less U Boats to worry about. You could also meet some DD's, what those US DD's they just happened to be going the same way as the Hood on neutrality patrol, and have an escort to Canada then Norfolk or some other US port for Refit and Rebuild.
I dont think the OP truly specified the extend of the damage in this alt timeline just that Hood “managed to limp home”. I would take that to mean more along the lines of she came close to going down vs she was a bit beat up but manage to sink Bismarck.
If she takes a heavy hit you could well see her lose speed enough that Bismarck pulls away.
That was always the problem with the battleships. Hit them in onecplace they flood, another they have a small explosion another they explode another soot and they lose fuel (for oil burning BBs) another and steering goes away and yet another spot takes out a turret ir two and another takes out and engine room or a boiler or whatever slowing her down.
So much a a BB is mission critical that if you hit and penetrate the main armor SOMETHING important is almost surely going to get damaged. it is just a question of what and how important that is in the current battle.
If hood loses the rear turret that is not to bad but a hit to the engine spaces and Bismarck sails away. Even flooding and counter flooding could slow her. And obviously she could simply blow up.
If you look at BB vs BB or BB vs BC battles in WW1 and WW2 there was a disturbing num er that did rather poorly and or got sunk/blew up or whatever. Now if you talked to strategists and designers of the day they probably tell you that the numbers were more or less what they expected. However there has always been a bit if a false belief that these things could ne pounded and pounded and pounded and just take it. And some of them did just that, But i think people had an still have a bit of a false belief in how hard they were to sink when facing a similarly armed shipe.
If she takes a heavy hit you could well see her lose speed enough that Bismarck pulls away.
That was always the problem with the battleships. Hit them in onecplace they flood, another they have a small explosion another they explode another soot and they lose fuel (for oil burning BBs) another and steering goes away and yet another spot takes out a turret ir two and another takes out and engine room or a boiler or whatever slowing her down.
So much a a BB is mission critical that if you hit and penetrate the main armor SOMETHING important is almost surely going to get damaged. it is just a question of what and how important that is in the current battle.
If hood loses the rear turret that is not to bad but a hit to the engine spaces and Bismarck sails away. Even flooding and counter flooding could slow her. And obviously she could simply blow up.
If you look at BB vs BB or BB vs BC battles in WW1 and WW2 there was a disturbing num er that did rather poorly and or got sunk/blew up or whatever. Now if you talked to strategists and designers of the day they probably tell you that the numbers were more or less what they expected. However there has always been a bit if a false belief that these things could ne pounded and pounded and pounded and just take it. And some of them did just that, But i think people had an still have a bit of a false belief in how hard they were to sink when facing a similarly armed shipe.